Vivé la république
by eponnia
Summary: "As the officer pulled the trigger, Enjolras thought, Éponine, I love you..." [E/E one-shot based on the 25th anniversary]


An Eponras fanfiction - Raminjolras (Ramin Karimloo) and Samponine (Samantha Barks). Nickrius (Nick Jonas as Marius).

* * *

><p><em>Vivé la République<em>

Rain poured down from the stormy sky above. The revolutionaries stood in a circle around Marius Pontmercy and the dying Éponine Thénardier. Blood covered her shoulder where the bullet had pierced her.

Alexandre Enjolras leaned on his gun, his dark eyes filling with tears. He did not bother to brush his black hair from his face, though it fell slightly in his eyes.

Why was Éponine chosen by fate to be the first to fall? She was only seventeen - she had barely tasted life before it was stolen by the French National Guard. Enjolras had personally shot the soldier who _dared_ to shoot her, firing before anyone could even react. He had immediately ran to her side and caught her as she staggered down the barricade. Enjolras had carried Éponine to the cold, unforgiving street below, calling for Joly, for anyone, to help. Marius had rushed to her, and the leader had forced himself to leave. He knew she would never survive the shot, but at least she would die happy in Marius' arms.

But now his heart commanded him to go to her side, though his mind refused, as she cried out in pain. He knew it wasn't Marius' fault that she was in pain, but some irrational part of his mind told him that Marius was causing her pain. _At least, Marius had caused some before, but it wasn't a visible wound_, Enjolras thought.

It wasn't Marius' fault that he was blind, Enjolras decided. Éponine's love was evident to everyone but the young man in love with the blonde girl living in the house with the overgrown garden. He was young, only nineteen. Still, Enjolras was furious every time Éponine became Marius' letter carrier. She was willing to give her heart to him, but he unintentionally ignored her and broke her heart every time. But Enjolras did not dare to speak to her, and though he was tempted, he restrained himself from throttling Marius. Éponine wouldn't appreciate it.

Enjolras brought himself back to the present. Dwelling on the past wouldn't change anything. He watched as Marius bowed his head over her body, holding Éponine tight.

"Remember, Marius," Éponine whispered, "rain..." Marius spoke along with her.

"Rain will help the flowers-"

Éponine closed her eyes, her last breath escaping from her lips. Marius kissed Éponine on the forehead as she went limp.

Marius looked up at the sky, and tears and the rain ran down his face. "Grow," he said, finishing the phrase.

Enjolras found that he couldn't move. He couldn't even breathe.

_She was dead. _

A rage rose inside him. Why did _she_ have to die? Why did a seventeen-year-old girl have to breathe her last breath here of all places? Her life had been full of lying, stealing, pain, and cold nights on the streets with no food. She deserved a better life than the one she lived.

He was furious at Marius, who broke her heart again and again. He was furious at the French National Guard for killing her. And he was furious at life, because it had cheated her. He gladly would have died in her place.

Why did she have to die?

"We fight in her name," a voice said. Enjolras realized it was his own.

He turned and picked a rose from a basket that sat in front of one of the abandoned homes behind the barricade. Enjolras came back to the circle and put a hand on Marius' shoulder. "Lay her near the barricade," he said, his cheeks wet with tears.

Marius picked up Éponine's body, and gently placed her at the foot of the barricade. Enjolras and Marius knelt over Éponine, and Enjolras put the rose in her hand.

He carefully smoothed her dark hair from her face. Enjolras wished that she would open her beautiful brown eyes once more. But he knew she would not, no matter how many times he prayed.

_Why did she have to die? _

He realized that Marius had risen to his feet, and Enjolras stood. Both men turned as shots rang out in the night. A volley of bullets rained down upon them from the French National Guard.

The now-familiar rage rose inside Enjolras again. He lifted his gun and climbed to the peak of the barricade, not caring that he was placing himself as a clear target for the enemy. He dimly heard Marius and Joly call his name, but one thought drowned out anything else – _make them pay for killing Éponine. _

He stood still, not bothering to dodge bullets. The French National Guards had terrible aim. He shot into their midst, picking out the cowardly officers hiding behind their men. He managed to shoot two officers before a bullet grazed his arm. He ignored the pain as crimson blood stained his shirt sleeve. Enjolras turned back to his men as someone shouted his name.

Suddenly, he felt the box he was standing on collapse. Enjolras realized that the National Guard had started to destroy the barricade itself. He tried to move to a more secure part of the barricade, but, before he could, he fell twenty feet to the street below – on the enemy side.

Enjolras immediately took a step back so his back was against the barricade. Facing the advancing French National Guard, he heard the revolutionaries shouting his name, but he did not dare look up at them. Though he fought fiercely, eyes blazing with fury for Éponine's killers, Enjolras was captured.

A few bold revolutionaries began to climb over the barricade to assist him, but as the soldiers dragged him away, Enjolras shouted, "Vivé la République!"

The rebels hesitated, knowing that their leader wanted them to leave him and continue the uprising in his absence. Marius was the first to move, shouting "Long live the Republic!" He raised the red flag as the students rallied around him.

That was the last image Enjolras saw of the uprisers before he was shoved into an abandoned home and chained to a huge iron bed. Two guards stood on watch over him as a soldier brought the general into the room.

"So, Alexandre Enjolras, you are the leader of these schoolboys, are you?" the general said.

Enjolras stood to be on eye-to-eye level with the pompous bourgeois. One of the guards hit him in the face with the butt of his rifle, caused Enjolras to take a step back from the force of the blow. The general said nothing at the guard's cruelty. Enjolras stood again, and when the guard raised his gun once more, his companion stopped him. Enjolras nodded slightly to the kinder guard, and the young man nodded in return.

"So, who is the leader now you are gone?" the general continued. Enjolras was silent, determined to reveal nothing to the enemy. "Do you have any more revolutions planned?" When he received no answer, the general became slightly annoyed. "What is the purpose of the uprising?" he demanded. "Are there more of you waiting in reserves?"

Now the general was becoming angry at Enjolras' silence. "I will pay you a hundred francs if you talk," he said. "A thousand francs," the general said when the black-haired revolutionary glared at him, not saying a word. "Three thousand francs!"

The guards gasped in surprise, and each turned their gasp into a cough, fearing the general's wrath. Only Enjolras was unmoved. He stared the general straight in the eye with a look that said, _you can give me the crown of France and I will never tell._

"Take him outside to the foot of the barricade. Make sure those boys pretending to be men," he sneered, "can see him. He will not say a word," the general said, "but maybe the sight of his lifeless body will prompt others to betray their cause."

The guards unchained him and roughly hauled him towards the door. Enjolras, however, stood his ground and stood for a moment before the general.

The leader of the revolution spat at the general's feet. In the dead silence that followed, Enjolras said, "Vivé la République."

"Get him out of my sight!" the general shouted.

The guards dragged him out to the street, a rifle pointed at his heart. Chaining his hands behind his back, the French National Guards stood in a circle around the doomed revolutionary. As an officer turned to the revolutionaries, Enjolras' thoughts turned to Éponine.

_You always said Marius was blind, but you were also, 'Ponine,_ he thought sadly. _Did you not see me? I was there for you when Marius did not see you, but you never saw me. Oh, Éponine, Éponine..._

"Your leader is going to die here before you!" shouted an officer to the uprisers watching from the top of the barricade. "You will all die like him – like the dogs you are!"

He turned back to Enjolras, pointing his gun at the leader of the uprising. "Any last words?" he snarled.

"The heavens will weep when the blood of the Republicans stains the streets of Paris," Alexandre Julien Enjolras, twenty-one-year-old leader of the June 6, 1832 revolution, said.

As the officer pulled the trigger, Enjolras thought, _Éponine, I love you..._

A gunshot rang out.


End file.
